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Exode 3:8
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Exode 3:8 Meaning and Commentary
And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the
Egyptians
Which must be understood consistent with the omnipresence of God, who is everywhere, and strictly speaking cannot be said to remove from place to place, or to descend; but such a way of speaking is used, when he gives some eminent display of his power or goodness, as here in a wonderful manner he appeared in a burning bush, and manifested himself in a way of grace and kindness to his people, signifying that he would shortly save them: so Christ in our nature came down from heaven to earth, to save his spiritual Israel out of the hands of all their enemies: and to bring them out of that land;
the land of Egypt, where they were in bondage, and greatly oppressed: unto a good land, and a large;
the land of Canaan, which was not only a good land, but a large one in comparison of Goshen, where the Israelites were pent up and straitened for room through their great increase; and though it was but a small country in itself, and when compared with some others, being but one hundred and sixty miles from Dan to Beersheba, and but forty six from Joppa to Bethlehem, and but sixty from Joppa to Jordan, yet, for so small a country, it had a great deal of good land in it; for Hecataeus F20 an Heathen writer, says it had in it three hundred myriads of acres of the best and most fruitful land: unto a land flowing with milk and honey;
which is not to be restrained merely to the abundance of cattle fed here, and the plenty of milk they produced, or the number of bees that swarmed here, and the quantity of honey they made; for the land abounded with other good things, and excellent fruits, as corn, and wine, and oil, and with figs, pomegranates, palm trees but this is a proverbial and hyperbolical expression, setting forth the great affluence of all sorts of good things in it, for the necessity and delight of human life: unto the place of the Canaanites;
who are mentioned first, as being the general name for the inhabitants of the land, as Aben Ezra suggests, though they are often spoken of as a distinct nation or tribe from the rest, and a principal one, denominated from Canaan the son of Ham: and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the
Hivites, and the Jebusites:
the Hittites and Amorites had their names from Heth and Emor, sons of Canaan; the Perizzites, Aben Ezra says, are the same with Sidon, who was the firstborn of Canaan: and the Hivites and Jebusites were the descendants also of sons of Canaan, ( Genesis 15:19-21 ) , the Girgashites are not here mentioned, either because they were a lesser people than the rest, as Aben Ezra thinks; or their land was not a land flowing with milk and honey, as Abendana observes; or they were gone out of the land before Israel went into it, according to other Jewish writers, or immediately yielded to Joshua, without fighting against him.
F20 Apud Joseph. contr. Apion. l. 1. c. 22.
